You have no idea what a pleasure it is to say
WELCOME TO REBELLION!
We are taking five places in London today,
we are present in 33 countries today
and the movement was born only 6 months ago!
I am Dr.Gail Bradbrook, I come from Yorkshire, I live in Gloucestershire, and I am a co-organizer and member of Extinction Rebellion.
I am a mother of two boys, my father was a minor.
I spent my life feeling a bit like I was not really in the right place
trying to be a scientist as a woman of the working class,
I know what it feels like, to feel like someone else knows what's happening
Working people have trouble making ends meet.
and they don't have a choice in conventional politics.
The current democracy no longer works,
it's deeply flawed
It's totally normal for lobbyists, who have billions to spend on solving certain problems,
to be constantly with governments to lobby
to preserve their own interests and make more money,
but not to defend the interests and needs of ordinary people.
I think it's a deeply toxic system! it's got this machinary based on
The idea that we have to have constant economic growth.
But you can not have constant economic growth on a finite planet.
Brexit is an irrelavance when you think about the climate and the ecological crisis we are experiencing.
The "Mother"" of al crisis means, it is possible that all life on Earth, 97% of life, will disappear.
and probably, in my childrens' life time.
Conventional politics is fucked! It's finish !
The question is not, "What needs to happen? What are the problems?"
but: How to change things?
We have a long tradition of civil disobedience in the UK.
When the Suffragettes smashed windows, which is what they did... they weren't directly
affecting democracy, they said "we are angry!" and asked for their votes to be heard.
All other more or less reformist strategies
for women to vote had not succeeded.
remaining silent and separated from each other, we are accomplices,
and so, what we do at XR is to really bring people together so they can express their power.
Political power should not be left to politicians and it shouldn be left simply to experts
We need the voice of the people and people need to understand
what the implication of any policy is
everyone should be able to say "yes, it's going to be difficult, but we are willing to do it because the situation is so desperate."
To create a new political model we have to do it all together, that's the point, right? Do it together.
There are ways to give people a voice. We want a Citizens' Assembly,
and, I think it's really an exciting innovation for a campaign to be calling for that
We would take about a thousand people by sortition
a selection as we would for jurors,
they would look at the reality, of the situation and if they do not know, they will be shocked and frightened.
They will be presented with potential solutions
and then they will need to come up with a set of laws, measures, and so on. for the United Kingdom.
As Privileged White, Western People
we have largely ignored the problem.
I come from Sierra Leone, and I hear people complaining about plastic waste,
but if you go to countries that are less fortunate than in the West, it's 10 times worse than here.
We all need to make a conscious effort to and work together. It's our Earth, our planet.
We must save her!
My name is Kofi Mawuli Klu, I am from Ghana, West Africa.
I describe myself as a Pan-African community advocate for global justice.
In school, we learned a lot about Greece, the Athenians, democracy, and all that
But for me, what existed before Athens?
The fact that we do not say anything about it is hugely problematic
If we could make the connections to the past, we would see, actually,
the challenge to take democracy further could enable humanity to peacefully resolve
a lot of the challenges that today seem so huge and totally insurmountable.
So each generation has the challenge of advancing the frontiers of what previous generations have done.
I think that's what Extinction Rebellion is trying to do
its going to lift all of the present generations to accomplish the task of our time
In other cultures, in some indigenous cultures,
the ancestors are honored, the ones who went before they stood out for life they did things for life
and you know that you have 7 generations in front of you,
I think that climate injustice is coming home to an intergenerational injustice.
it's like for our today we are fucking up your tomorrow, we are stealing your tomorrow. It's deeply injust.
Sometimes I try to talk to other parents about this. "Oouuh, do not tell me about that!"
This civilization is finished! It's finished, whether you like it or not.
If we have three years of really bad el niño weather, the food system are fucked.
We will be fighting over cans of beans. We really are at a crossroads.
What we choose to do today is the difference between life or death on Earth.
We must create something more beautiful,
and more connected, and more local.
Life is so short. It has a start and an end. We must do something wild and amazing with that time.
Grief is the price we pay for love, and from love comes courage.
And that's when you say, "I've had enough of this!" and that's when you get on the streets.